VASJ's Deandre Forte and Lima Central Catholic's Ethan O'Connor battle for the ball in the first quarter. VASJ lost 64-62 in the Division III state championship game on March 22 in the Value City Arena in the Jerome Schottenstein Center in Columbus.

COLUMBUS — Part of Ashen Ward wishes he could remember.
Another part of him might be glad he doesn’t.
As Villa Angela-St. Joseph was preparing for a weekend run in the Division III state basketball tournament, Ward, now an assistant at his alma mater, said he couldn’t remember his final game as a senior in 2008 when VASJ lost to Sugarcreek Garaway, 50-47, on a buzzer-beating 3-pointer in a Division III state semifinal.

PHOTOS FROM THE GAME
“I don’t remember the game,” he said. “I remember the last shot. I remember we lost. I don’t remember anything else.”
Sometimes a bitter memory that fades quickly is a good thing — it keeps one from taking a kick to the gut every morning when the memory is rekindled.
For the 2013-14 VASJ basketball team, a daily reminder of the 64-62 loss to Lima Central Catholic the Vikings sustained on March 22 might be a good thing. It will remind the Vikings how close they came to glory and the near-shave they had at legendary status in Ohio high school basketball.
The loss will also serve as an unparalleled motivation factor.
Had VASJ defeated Lima Central Catholic, the Vikings would have had their first repeat championship since 1994-95. The Vikings would also have had a state record as being the only team in Ohio history to have won a state championship in all four enrollment divisions.
They also would have had Step II in what they hoped and planned would be a run of three straight state championships that — had they done it — would have tied them at seven with Middletown for the most state championships in Ohio by one school.
Instead, the Vikings have a silver trophy they don’t really want and a Viking boat-load full of regrets — reminders that will serve as motivational factors the next time they pick up a basketball.
Which might be today.
“You’re always upset when you lose,” junior guard Brian Parker said. “But to lose in the state championship game fuels the fire.”
Parker nearly salvaged a miraculous win for his team when his heave from just short of midcourt glanced off the rim and came to the floor.
It would have been an awe-inspiring victory had the final shot gone in. It would have been VASJ’s first and only lead of the game. It would have been for a state championship.
Woulda’s aren’t tough to come by, though, when such shots don’t go in, though.
“Woulda, coulda, shoulda,” Coach Babe Kwasniak said during his somber postgame news conference, second-guessing himself for staying in a zone defense too long.
There were plenty of other opportunities to second guess or wonder what-if.
What if Parker would have D’ed up Martyce Kimbrough from the get-go, not just in the second half? The co-Division III player in Ohio with Parker torched VASJ for 18 first-half points, but was held to four points in the second half with Parker in his hip pocket.
What if the Vikings had gotten not a hand, but one solitary finger, on one of the four floaters Xavier Simpson sank? Instead, each made it over a defender’s hand and reached its apex with the top of the backboard before tickling the twine.
What if VASJ would have gotten the rebound when Jake Williams missed a free throw with 4.7 left? What if the Vikings would have gotten the rebound after Simpson got the aforementioned board and got fouled with 1.7 ticks remaining?
And most of all, what would have happened if the final shot had gone in?
Like Kwasniak said, “Woulda, coulda, shoulda.”
They’re the first words in the dictionary of the unsuccessful.
“I can’t even talk on that. I’m just very mad. Upset with myself,” Bragg said of the late rebounds. “I could have gotten the loose ball (two possessions earlier). Then when (Williams) was out the foul line, I could have boxed out and gotten the rebound. I put those on myself.”
Over the coming months — actually, more than likely it will be over the coming days and weeks — each of the Vikings will micromanage the Division III state championship game the same way Bragg was minutes after the final buzzer sounded.
The good news for the VASJ program, which will return seven of the eight players in Kwasniak’s rotation, is that the goals and the record books are still out there to be attacked. The young Vikings can win the program’s sixth state championship NEXT year. They can become the first school to win a state title in all four divisions of enrollment NEXT year.
But it will be a long 12 months worth of kicks in the gut between now and then.
Ashen Ward doesn’t remember his final game of heartbreak in 2008. But something says this group of Vikings will remember the happenings of March 22, 2014.
In fact, it might make them that much better in the long run.
“We’ll remember this moment,” Parker said. “And every game we go to, at every workout or practice, we’ll work even harder so we won’t feel this moment again.”